and that leads you back to the negotiations over the fiscal cliff. and i think this raises the pressure to get a deal done. that's important. and the part of the deal that is actually not being talked about, but which will be central, is the spending side. the sequester is a very bad policy. both sides agree it needs to go away. they have to figure out how. and the tax side has to be matched by entitlent reforms, and you can pick 37 if you have the right entitlement reforms, but only 36 if you have less and you could get 38 if you have more. there's a lot of work left to be done. >> let's talk about that, robert. on the spending side. do you think that there's any way the democrats get out of this over the next 18 or 24 months without really addressing spending and probably annoying a lot of their base in the process? >> well, the president has already put a lot of spending cuts on the table. let me partially agree with doug. the employment report today was, although it looked pretty encouraging if you look at the numbers underneath the numbers, it w